A Flock of ’Televi’ Soar in UKTV Spot by The Mill

UKTV has revealed the next advertising campaign for its free TV streaming service, UKTV Play. It aims to ignite feelings of joy and excitement at being able to watch great television wherever and whenever viewers choose.

 

The campaign includes a high-impact SFX advert, shot and produced by UKTV Creative, which stars a flock of intricately-designed flying televisions soaring over the South Coast of England to visualise the sense of freedom UKTV Play provides. UKTV partnered with industry-leading VFX, design and content creation studio The Mill for the first time to create the winged ‘televi.’ 2D and 3D special effects were developed and implemented by their specialist VFX team.

 

Sixty, 40 and 20 second versions of the ad will go out on air, amplified by targeted advertising on Facebook and Google, bespoke mobile ads generated via Loop Me, TVTY display advertising on desktop and additional social activation on Twitter.

 

The ads will air across the UKTV network of 10 channels, reaching 61% of all adults in the UK. The broadcaster has also bought spots on Channel 4’s on demand service, All4.

 

Awareness of UKTV Play has risen by 64% since the last ad campaign in June last year, with views also up by 78%.

 

Paul Philpott, UKTV’s creative manager explained, “There were a myriad of practical questions to answer such as: what kind of wings would a set-free television have? How do they behave? Do different models of TV have different wings? Solving these problems involved working closely with the team of 2D and 3D specialist VFX artists at The Mill who created 30 pairs of intricately different, photo-real wings.”

 

Michael Chapman, Joint Head of 3D at The Mill said, “A 12-strong team of The Mill’s finest VFX artists were tasked with the highly-unique challenge of creating a flock of flying televisions, each with their own set of unique wings, for UKTV Play’s latest campaign. 

 

The key task was to work out a realistic way to seamlessly fix wings to a TV and make it fly in a fun but believable way.

 

The Mill team worked tirelessly over an eight-week period to ensure every detail of the winged ‘televi’ were perfected, each feather crafted using The Mill’s bespoke, in-house feather tool.

 

To ensure the best possible final look, The Mill’s VFX team were present during the three day shoot to assist the director and director of photography, helping compose each shot. The team even took a stuffed barn owl on set for extra accuracy and lighting references!”

 

Scott Russell, creative director, UKTV added, “The ad marks another step forward in the evolution of UKTV Play. We know that viewers want to be entertained anywhere they like, so we decided to create a distinctive campaign that reminds them they can. We also wanted to powerfully bring to life the emotion of freedom that comes with TV on demand.”

 

UKTV Creative officially launched in 2015 and has already won a haul of awards for its work. UKTV decided to bring all creative in-house in January, announcing a bespoke, integrated creative and media service for UKTV and its brands.